Great YouTube clips

[x-man]

This is the only other flash mob I will post.  It doesn't have the splash of the Moscow Flash Mob, but the concept and cleverness of its execution are, perhaps, more interesting.  You have to know of Rembrandt's "Night Watch" to fully appreciate it.  The Dutch people watching it happen certainly did.

[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6W2ZMpsxhg[/youtube]

[x-man]

DOROTHY -- sung by Judy Collins from HARD TIMES FOR LOVERS

Some may say that my YouTube song suggestions are bleak, speaking only of regret and desolation, and are aimed at those whose lives have not turned out as they planned, and those for whom love has not been their frequent friend.  Well, I like sad songs.

Think of "Dorothy" as Judy Collins singing not only about Dorothy in Kansas, and about the people I described, but especially about Ennis some years after he loses Jack, and is thinking back to the summer on the mountain, to "the single moment of artless charmed happiness in their separate and difficult lives."

{Living in Kansas, a life alone,
she never married, she's hardly known.
She stares out the window, far away,
looking for another windy day.

Dorothy was a fool to leave;
she could have stayed.
She held it right in her hands, she had it made.
She could have had it all for keeps, she was afraid,
she could have stayed.

It seems like only yesterday,
but 40 years have up and slipped away,
since a lovely, black-haired girl
was taken for her one and only whirl.

Dorothy was a fool to leave.........

Same old bluebirds flying high
over rainbows in the Kansas sky.
Why oh why?
Oh why?

I guess it only serves her right
for trading all that colour for black and white.
All her sorrow, all because
there ain't no way to stay in Kansas when you've been to Oz.

Dorothy was a fool to leave......}

What makes this song so poignant to me is that life teaches that Dorothy could NOT have stayed in Oz, that the summer on BBM was bound to end, and the snow had to come.  But do we have to trade all that colour for black and white so quickly?  That is a savage reality to have to face.




[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKW38w8gJfE[/youtube]

[Sason]

What if....

homosexuality were normative, and heterosexuality was nonstandard?

Here's a well made reverse take on things.


[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CnOJgDW0gPI[/youtube]

[x-man]

What if....
homosexuality were normative, and heterosexuality was nonstandard?
Here's a well made reverse take on things.

I watched this clip here, and then went to YouTube to see what the comments were to the film.  They were wide ranging, but I wonder if many of the people got the message.  What do you think?

Sason, do you know whom this film is aimed at--is it for anti-bullying in schools or for adults to think about?  I do think that asking kids, or many older people, to see themselves in the characters in the film will not be all that successful without a lot of guidance--however heavy-handed it must be.

[Sason]

I don't know the story behind the video, or whom it's aimed at. I picked it off Facebook and posted it here.

Maybe it's a bit blunt, but I think it's an interesting and innovative take on the subject. Maybe it can provide food for thought for people who aren't completely rigid.

A bit like the novel from the 70s, Egalia's Daughters by Gerd Brantenberg, where the gender roles are completely reversed in every little detail, even the language.

[x-man]

LOOKING FOR AN ECHO by KENNY VANCE AND THE PLANOTONES

This is a sweet and poignant look at the highpoint of R&B.  If you're old enough, this song is a about a lot more than music.

At Erasmus Old High School we used to harmonize,
me and Danny and Ira, and two Italian guys.
We were singing oldies, but they were newies then,
and today when I play my old 45's, I remember when

We'd practice in a subway, in a lobby or a hall,
crowded in a doorway singing doo wops to the wall,
and if we went to a party and they wouldn't let us sing,
we'd lock ourselves in the bathroom and nobody could get in.

'Cause we were looking for an echo, an answer to our sound,
a place to be in harmony, a place we almost found.

And the girls would gather round us, and our heads would really swell.
We'd sing songs by the Moonglows, the Harptones and the Dells,
and when we sang "Sincerely" we really sang it high.
Even though it was falsetto, it almost reached the sky.

We've sung a lot of changes since 1955,
and a lot of bad arrangements we've tried to harmonize.
Now we've turned into oldies, but we were newies then
and today when I play my old 45's I remember when

We were looking for an echo, an answer to our sound,
a place to be in harmony, a place we almost found.

[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ke1dV_IpSKA[/youtube]

[Sophia]

Amazing beutiful dance and song, worth sharing.

[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LifAcqepJVI[/youtube]

[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qU6ye0Kjw4o[/youtube]

[x-man]

Some of you are going to accuse me of being very sick for posting this, others will learn something, and perhaps some of you will be amused.
This is the Scarfing Scene from the last episode of QAF's first season.
If you don't know what "scarfing" is, google it now (I am not going to tell you), because if you don't know what it is, you won't have any idea what is going on.
That such a dangerous practice would be treated with such lush cinematography and music is amazing.  The scarf itself is the central character.

[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_Ene48fP4U[/youtube]

[CellarDweller]

can't see the video at work, and from what scarfing is described as, that's probably a good thing.

[x-man]

can't see the video at work, and from what scarfing is described as, that's probably a good thing.

Did you watch the video when you got home?
Put that scarf down immediately!